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Superintendent's Report October 7, 2014

posted Oct 14, 2014, 11:06 AM by jfortuna@hudson.k12.ma.us

Superintendent’s Report

Progress
Toward Goals and Superintendent’s Professional Growth

New
Superintendent’s Induction Program Content Day

I
attended my 3rd of 8 full-day content sessions on October 1st.
The primary areas of focus were identifying and developing District strategy
and evaluating principals. I consider any conference where you leave with at
least one good idea that you can put into practice a worthwhile endeavor. The day
forced me to critically examine the strategy work that we had undertaken as a
District Leadership Team last year. A realization that I had is that our
strategic objectives are too narrow. Another concern that surfaced was the fact
that, as a District Leadership Team, we have not had an opportunity to do the
type of root cause analysis that is needed to be reasonably sure that our
Strategic Objectives are the right areas of focus to improve our student
achievement. We also had a guest speaker through the wonders of Skype who
detailed how he resolved this tension. It was a thought provoking day.

School Visits

In
the past two weeks I have visited the Forest Avenue and Mulready Elementary
Schools. In each classroom visit I had the opportunity to visit fourth grade
classrooms. In 1/3 of the fourth grade classrooms I observed, I had wonderful,
rich discussions with students about their literacy tools that they were using
while reading. The students were focusing on the skill of good readers ask
questions. I was impressed with how each student I spoke with displayed
metacognition of the strategies they were using while engaged with literature.
The remaining 2/3 of the fourth grade math classrooms were engaged in math
instruction. I am aware of the heightened concern that many families are
feeling regarding the new math program and I invite them to join Karen Martin,
Director of Elementary Curriculum, on Wednesday October 8th, for a District
Elementary Math Workshop Presentation in the Farley Elementary School Cafeteria
from 6:30-8:30. Mrs. Martin will be presenting on the math workshop model using
the Engage NY Program. The math instruction I observed was related to the skill
of estimation and place value of larger numbers. The objective was
developmentally appropriate. For parents that are looking for more information
on the Engage NY Program, each elementary school website now has a link to more
information. There are also some helpful videos regarding tackling homework. We
will continue to monitor the efficacy of the program in helping our teachers
present rigorous, standards-based math content in a manner that results in
student learning and the transfer of skills.

Finance
and Operations and Facilities

Transportation

We
currently only have one outstanding transportation issue that the
transportation team is aware of. Our transportation provider, North Reading
Transportation, has completed a safety study and we are awaiting the final
written report.

Secondary School
Enhanced Lockdown Drills

Our
High School and Middle School held school safety drills on Friday, October 3rd.I would like to thank Mr. Reagan and Mr.
Webster for the thoughtfully worded notifications they sent to families. The
following information is taken directly from Mr. Reagan’s message to Hudson
High Families: These drills allowed our students and staff to
practice the District's enhanced school lock down procedures. Our new procedures have been developed in
consultation with the Hudson Police and are based on practices identified by
law enforcement agencies across the country supported by evidence from real
life situations. The new procedures give
students and staff options with respect to their response in the event of a
crisis. In the unlikely event of a
school crisis where the safety of the building is compromised, staff members
will direct students to either barricade the classroom, evacuate the building,
or fight back. On Friday, each building
ran three short scenarios allowing all students and staff to practice each of
the possible responses in a controlled manner.
Students were briefed on the new procedures during short class meetings on
the day prior to the drill being conducted.

Unfortunately,
the need to conduct drills of this kind have become a reality in American
schools. While we cannot possibly
prepare for every scenario, we believe, and evidence supports, that the best
way to keep individuals safe in the event of an emergency is by giving them
options.

Parent
and Community Groups

School Health
and Safety Advisory Council

On
Friday, September 26th, I attended the first School Health and
Safety Advisory Council meeting for the 2104-2015 school year. This council has
as its mission: To serve as a Hudson area
community forum to address the topics of physical and mental health, wellness,
safety and nutrition that influence student success and learning.
Twenty-four people attended this meeting.

The
goals identified for this year are:

1. Present recommended updates for
Wellness Policy to School Health and Safety Advisory Council on December 12,
2014. After these recommendations are fully vetted by the full council they
will be ready for presentation to the School Committee Policy Subcommittee.

2. Provide draft crisis guidelines to
Superintendent for review. These will be
presented to the council at the March 20,2015 meeting.

The
School Health and Safety Advisory Council has broken into two subcommittees to
complete this work. I would like to thank Tammy Murphy and Lee Waingortin for
volunteering to co-lead the crisis guidelines subcommittee and Ellen Capstick
for leading the Wellness Policy Recommendation subcommittee. Mrs. Jenny
Gormley, Director of Health, Nursing and Safety, does an outstanding job of
chairing this group.

Middlesex County
School Safety Summit

Mr.
Reagan, Mr. Webster and I attended the Middlesex County School Safety Summit on
Thursday, October 2nd. This is an annual program put on by Middlesex
County DA Marian Ryan. This years line-up of speakers included MA Secretary of
Education, Matthew Malone. Mr. Malone spoke about the Governor’s Task Force
Report on School Safety which provides resources for school crisis planning. David
Esquith, Director for the Office of Safe and Healthy Students, United States
Department of Education, spoke to the audience about the need to take a
balanced, operational approach to school safety planning. He highlighted for us
that the focus on big national events often leads to tightly focused, narrow
views of what school safety means. Examples he provided were the highly
publicized student suicides due to bullying four years ago leading to a call
for a focus by schools on bullying prevention programs, the tragic events at
Sandy Hook Elementary and other recent school shootings leading to a focus by
schools on active shooter response plans. Mr. Esquith counterbalanced this by
showing the statistical fact that more children are severely impacted by
bicycle accidents and drowning than by these more publicized events. He used
these illustrations to encourage balance in our approach to school safety
planning. It is all important, but it must be viewed broadly and all
encompassing.

In
my opinion, the most powerful speaker of the day was Michele Gay, M.Ed.,
founder of Safe and Sound Schools. http://www.safeandsoundschools.org/ This
organization works as a clearinghouse of resources available to school
communities and their website identifies the organization as the following:
“(a) source for information, resources,
and ideas for improving safety in your school community. We are a non-profit organization, dedicated
to empowering community members to learn how they can join hands, hearts, and
minds to make schools safer.”

Currently
a resident of Sudbury, Mrs. Gay told the story of losing her youngest daughter
in the tragedy at Sandy Hook. Through her sorrow and pain she found the
strength to never give up and created this organization to support other
communities make their schools safer. It was an honor to hear her speak.

Personnel
and Celebrations

Special
Education Community Outreach and Integration

We
have had two excellent, well attended community wide special education events. The first was our fall integrated sport, Bocce
Ball. We now have an integrated sport for each season that our students with
special needs can participate in.We had
22 participants at the first meeting held at Forest Avenue. We ran two groups
and had dads interacting with their children throughout the night. Mrs.
Kilcoyne reports that this was a heartwarming event. We will have integrated
basketball for our students in the winter and integrated track and field in the
spring. This is another reason why I am so proud to be in Hudson. We also held
our first sensory-friendly movie morning where about 50 attendees gathered at
Hudson High School on Saturday, September 26th to watch the movie
Frozen. I am told that the sound of children singing was beautiful. The
families that attended are eagerly anticipating the next event and have shared
some wonderful ideas about events they would like to see happen. Mrs. Kilcoyne
is looking forward to exploring these further.

District
Events

October
8District Elementary
Math Night6:30-8:30 p.m.Farley

October
11 A Midsummer
Night’s Dream 7:00 p.m. HHS

October
12 A Midsummer
Night’s Dream 2:00 p.m. HHS

October
13 No School Columbus
Day

October
15 &16 Elementary Half
Days PreK-4Conferences

October
22 District Half Day Professional
Day

October
23 HHS Evening Conferences

Enrollment

All
enrollment numbers are up to date as of the writing of this report. They are
unofficial numbers. The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary
Education collects snapshots of enrollment data three times per year October,
March, and June. I will provide you with monthly enrollment and School Choice
numbers so that you can be aware of the amount of fluctuation that may or may
not be occurring on a monthly basis.